US to invest $60m into Ghana's energy sector

The United States Ambassador to Ghana, Robert Jackson, has said the United States will invest 60 million US dollars into Ghana’s energy sector in the next few years to boost the sector.

Robert Jackson disclosed this when he paid a courtesy call on the Upper East Regional Minister, Rockson Bukhari in Bolgatanga.

“We are also working with Northern Electricity Distribution Company(NEDco) on the energy situation, although NEDco has been doing well, we will invest about six million dollars in NEDco over the next few years, to see how that investment will work and how it will impact that region,” he said.

This package is to enhance the operations of the Northern Electricity Distribution Company(NEDco), to make the provision of electricity more efficient and diversified in Northern Ghana. The Ambassador also added that, the US government is also supporting the retooling of Ghana’s security agencies in readiness to combat terrorism.

There was a total blackout in the Tamale Metropolis in the latter part of 2017, following an inferno that gutted 11 panels of the VRA/NEDco substation at Choggu Hilltop.

NEDco-VRA at the time also served notice that the company is on the verge of collapse largely due to power theft.

The company’s Corporate Communications Director, Maxwell Kotoka, brought this to the fore at a news conference in Tamale where he disclosed that 45 percent of power theft was recorded in the Tamale area.

Stealing of power has become an established practice in the Northern Region for which reason authorities of the Northern Electricity Distribution Company (NEDco), have served notice to install prepaid meters for all its customers.

Records showed that, as of April to June 2014 ending, NEDco lost eight GHC800, 000 as a result of illegal connections and non-payment of electricity bills in the Tamale Metro area alone.

NEDco’s Director of Services, David Adomako-Mensah at a media briefing in Tamale, disclosed that 426 illegal power thieves were arrested for various offences.